The S. W. F. Club eBook

“We’d love to,” Pauline answered
heartily; “’cross lots, it’s not
so very far over here from the parsonage, and,”
she hesitated, “you—­you’ll
be seeing Hilary quite often, while she’s at
The Maples, perhaps?”

“I hope so. Father’s on the lookout
for a horse and rig for me, and then she and I can
have some drives together. She will know where
to find the prettiest roads.”

“Oh, she would enjoy that,” Pauline said
eagerly, and as she drove on, she turned more than
once to glance back at the tall, slender figure crossing
the field. Shirley seemed to walk as if the mere
act of walking were in itself a pleasure. Pauline
thought she had never before known anyone who appeared
so alive from head to foot.

“Go ’long, Fanny!” she commanded;
she was in a hurry to get home now, with her burden
of news. It seemed to her as if she had been
away a long while, so much had happened in the meantime.

At the parsonage gate, Pauline found Patience waiting
for her. “You have taken your time, Paul
Shaw!” the child said, climbing in beside her
sister.

“Fanny’s time, you mean!”

“It hasn’t come yet!” Patience said
protestingly. “I went for the mail myself
this afternoon, so I know!”

“Oh, well, perhaps it will to-morrow,”
Pauline answered, with so little of real concern in
her voice, that Patience wondered. “Suppose
you take Fanny on to the barn. Mother’s
home, isn’t she?”

“Who’s asking things now!” Patience
drew the reins up tightly and bouncing up and down
on the carriage seat, called sharply—­“Hi
yi! Hi yi!”

It was the one method that never failed to rouse Fanny’s
indignation, producing, for the moment, the desired
effect; still, as Pauline said, it was hardly a proceeding
that Hilary or she could adopt, or, least of all,
their father.

As she trotted briskly off to the barn now, the very
tilt of Fanny’s ears expressed injured dignity.
Dignity was Fanny’s strong point; that, and
the ability to cover less ground in an afternoon than
any other horse in Winton. The small human being
at the other end of those taut reins might have known
she would have needed no urging barnwards.

“Maybe you don’t like it,” Patience
observed, “but that makes no difference—­’s
long’s it’s for your good. You’re
a very unchristiany horse, Fanny Shaw. And I’ll
‘hi yi’ you every time I get a chance;
so now go on.”

However Patience was indoors in time to hear all but
the very beginning of Pauline’s story of her
afternoon’s experience. “I told you,”
she broke in, “that I saw a nice girl at church
last Sunday—­in Mrs. Dobson’s pew;
and Mrs. Dobson kept looking at her out of the corner
of her eyes all the tune, ’stead of paying attention
to what father was saying; and Miranda says, ten to
one. Sally Dobson comes out in—­”